Today, applications such as Apple® iTunes® enable users to share their media collections over a Local Area Network (LAN). However, these applications have significant shortcomings in that they are restricted by the network boundaries of the LAN. For example, once a user device is disconnected from the LAN, the media items stored by that user device are no longer accessible to the other user devices connected to the LAN. Likewise, the user device that has disconnected from the LAN no longer has access to the media items stored by the other user devices that are connected to the LAN. Thus, there is a need for a system and method for sharing media collections that are not limited by network boundaries.